While not a fan of waste or big government, one fallacy in the article is:

“The military are compensated at rates substantially greater than their civilian counterparts .

There is no such thing as a civilian counterpart to a military member. There may overlap or similiarity in a particular skill set, but no civilian has volunteered to stand and die if needed.

I do note that SEN Coburn was born on March 14, 1948, making him 18 in 1966. How did he miss participating in the Southeast Asia war games? Perhaps if he had competed on the blue team he would understand the above distinction a little better.